Download Letters and Sounds - Sonning Common Primary School

1 of 13 The National Strategies  Early Years
CLLD – Helping your child with speaking, listening, reading and writing
Letters and Sounds
Phonics information for parents
and carers with children in
Reception classes
Where you see the
learning.
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symbol you will find some suggested activities that will support your child in their
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CLLD – Helping your child with speaking, listening, reading and writing
Introduction
As you know, the ability to read and write well is a vital skill for all children, paving the way for an enjoyable
and successful school experience.
Children learn and practise many of the skills that they need for reading and writing from a very early age.
They do this through a wide range of activities and experiences, at home, in settings and in school. They
explore and learn through singing and saying rhymes, making and listening to music, talking with others,
sharing books with adults and other children, dressing up, experimenting with writing and using puppets and
toys to retell and make up stories.
Children’s spoken language supports reading and writing
In order to make a good start in reading and writing, children need to have an adult listen to them and talk to
them. Speaking and listening are the foundations for reading and writing. Even everyday activities such as
preparing meals, tidying up, putting shopping away and getting ready to go out offer you the chance to talk
to your child, explaining what you are doing. Through these activities, children hear the way language is put
together into sentences for a purpose.
Books are a rich source of new words for your child; words you would not use in everyday conversations
appear in books. Children need to have a wide vocabulary to understand the meaning of books, so read
aloud and share books as often as you can. They will enjoy it and it will be useful to them when they come
across these words in their own reading later on.
So support and develop the speaking and listening skills of your children!
Ways you can support your children at home: talking and listening

Make time to listen to your child talking – as you meet them from their setting or school, as
you walk, or travel home by car, in the supermarket as you shop, at meal times, bath times,
bedtimes – any time!

Switch off the TV, radio and mobile phones – and really listen!

Show that you are interested in what they are talking about – look at your child, smile, nod
your head, ask a question or make a response to show that you really have been listening.

Make a collection of different toy creatures – for example, a duck, a snake, an alien, say the
sound it might make as you play together, for example, ‘quack-quack’, ‘ssssssss’, ‘yuk-yuk’,
and encourage your child to copy you.

Listen at home – switch off the TV and listen to the sounds, both inside and outside the home.
Can your child tell you what sounds they heard, in the order in which they heard them?

Play-a-tune – and follow me! Make or buy some simple shakers, drums and beaters, then play
a simple tune and ask your child to copy. Have fun!

Use puppets and toys to make up stories or retell known ones. Record your child telling the
story and play it back to them.
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Sounds in spoken language – the beginning of phonics
At Sonning Common Primary school, when children enter the Reception class they take part in high-quality
phonics sessions every day. These are fun sessions involving lots of speaking, listening and games, where
the emphasis is on children’s active participation. They learn to use their phonic knowledge for reading and
writing activities and in their independent play.
The aim of this booklet is to give you a clear picture of how we approach the teaching of phonics and word
recognition and how, as a parent or carer, you can support and encourage your child at home.
Not all children will learn at the same rate!
Your child should be supported whatever their rate of learning. There is a very close link between difficulty
with phonics and hearing so, if your child is making progress more slowly than might be expected, it would
be worth having their hearing checked.
From a very early stage, children develop awareness of different sounds in spoken language. They develop
understanding that spoken words are made up of different sounds (phonemes) and they learn to match
these phonemes to letters (graphemes). Phonics is about children knowing how letters link to sounds
(graphemes to phonemes), for example, c as in ‘cat’, ll as in ‘fell’, ee as in ‘sheep’.
Children use this phonic knowledge when they are reading and writing. This approach has been shown to
provide a quick and efficient way for most young children to learn to read words on the page, fluently and
accurately. We want children to develop this skill so that it becomes automatic. This also greatly helps them
with their spelling.
At Sonning Common Primary school we use a systematic phonics programme called Letters and Sounds.
Letters and Sounds is divided into six phases, with each phase building on the skills and knowledge of
previous learning. There are no big leaps in learning. Children have time to practise and rapidly expand their
ability to read and spell words. They are also taught to read and spell ‘tricky words’, which are words with
spellings that are unusual or that children have not yet been taught.
Phase 1
This paves the way for systematic learning of phonics and usually starts in nursery or playgroup.
Teachers plan activities that will help children to listen attentively to sounds around them, such as the
sounds of their toys and to sounds in spoken language. Teachers teach a wide range of nursery rhymes and
songs. They read good books to and with the children. This helps to increase the number of words they
know – their vocabulary – and helps them talk confidently about books.
Ways you can support your children at home
Play ‘What do we have in here?’ Put some toys or objects in a bag and pull one out at a time. Emphasise
the first sound of the name of the toy or object by repeating it, for example, ‘c c c c – car’, ‘b b b b – box’, ‘ch
ch ch ch – chip’.
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Say: ‘A tall tin of tomatoes!’ ‘Tommy, the ticklish teddy!’ ‘A lovely little lemon!’ This is called alliteration. Use
names, for example, ‘Gurpreet gets the giggles’, ‘Milo makes music’, ‘Naheema’s nose’.
Teach them ‘Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers’.
Learning how to ‘sound-talk’
The teacher shows children how to do this – c-a-t = cat. The separate sounds (phonemes) are spoken
aloud, in order, all through the word, and are then merged together into the whole word. The merging
together is called blending and is a vital skill for reading.
Children will also learn to do this the other way around – cat = c-a-t. The whole word is spoken aloud and
then broken up into its sounds (phonemes) in order, all through the word. This is called segmenting and is a
vital skill for spelling.
This is all oral (spoken). Your child will not be expected to match the letter to the sound at this stage. The
emphasis is on helping children to hear the separate sounds in words and to create spoken sounds.
Ways you can support your children at home
Sound-talking
Find real objects around your home that have three phonemes (sounds) and practise ‘sound talk’. First, just
let them listen, then see if they will join in, for example, saying:
‘I spy a p-e-g – peg.’
‘I spy a c-u-p – cup.’
‘Where’s your other s-o-ck – sock?’
‘Simon says – put your hands on your h-ea-d.’
‘Simon says – touch your ch-i-n.’
‘Simon says – pick up your b-a-g.’
Phase 2
In this phase children will continue practising what they have learned from phase 1, including ‘sound-talk’.
They will also be taught the phonemes (sounds) for a number of letters (graphemes), which phoneme is
represented by which grapheme and that a phoneme can be represented by more than one letter, for
example, /ll/ as in b-e-ll. They may be using pictures or hand movements to help them remember these.
VC and CVC words
C and V are abbreviations for ‘consonant’ and ‘vowel’. VC words are words consisting of a vowel then a
consonant (e.g. am, at, it) and CVC words are words consisting of a consonant then a vowel then a
consonant (e.g. cat, rug, sun). Words such as tick and bell also count as CVC words – although they have
four letters, they have only three sounds. For example, in the word bell, b = consonant, e = vowel, ll =
consonant.
Now the children will be seeing letters and words, as well as hearing them. They will be shown how to make
whole words by pushing magnetic or wooden letters together to form little words, reading little words on the
interactive whiteboard and breaking up words into individual sounds, which will help their spelling. These will
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be simple words made up of two phonemes, for example, am, at, it, or three phonemes, for example, cat,
rug, sun, tick, bell.
Tricky words
They will also learn several tricky words: the, to, I, go, no.
Children will still be practising oral blending and segmenting skills daily. They need plenty of practice at
doing this.
Saying the sounds
Your child will be taught how to pronounce the sounds (phonemes) correctly to make blending easier.
Sounds should be sustained where possible (e.g. sss, fff, mmm) and, where this is not possible, ‘uh’ sounds
after consonants should be reduced as far as possible (e.g. try to avoid saying ‘buh’, ‘cuh’). Teachers help
children to look at different letters and say the right sounds for them.
Contact your child’s school for more information about this important aspect of phonics.
Ways you can support your children at home
Magnetic letters
Buy magnetic letters for your fridge, or for use with a tin tray. Find out which letters have been taught – have
fun finding these with your child and place them on the magnetic surface.
Making little words together
Make little words together, for example, it, up, am, and, top, dig, run, met, pick. As you select the letters, say
them aloud: ‘a-m – am’, ‘m-e-t – met’.
Breaking words up
Now do it the other way around: read the word, break the word up and move the letters away, saying: ‘met –
m-e-t’.
Both these activities help children to see that reading and spelling are reversible processes.
Don’t forget the writing box!
Spelling is harder than reading words – praise, don’t criticise. Little whiteboards and pens, and magic
boards, are a good way for children to try out spellings and practise their handwriting.
Your child might be trying to use letters from their name to write; this shows that they know that writing
needs real alphabet letters.
Make or buy an alphabet poster.
Getting ready for writing
Teachers will model how to form letters (graphemes) correctly, so that children can eventually acquire a
fluent and legible handwriting style. These skills develop over a long period of time. A child’s ability to form a
letter correctly is a separate skill from phonics. Holding a pen or pencil needs considerable co-ordination
and practice in making small movements with hands and fingers.
In the early phonic phases children can use letter cards or magnetic letters to demonstrate their knowledge
of phonics.
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Writing in lower-case letters
We shall be teaching lower-case letters, as well as capital letters. As most writing will be in lower-case
letters it is useful if you can use these at home. A good start is for your child to write their name correctly,
starting with a capital letter followed by lower-case letters.
Your child’s teacher can advise on the handwriting style that is taught and how you can help at home.
Ways you can support your children at home
Using their whole body
For handwriting children need to be well co-ordinated through their whole body, not just their hands and
fingers. Games that help co-ordination include throwing balls at a target, under-arm and over-arm, and
bouncing balls – also skipping on the spot, throwing a Frisbee, picking up pebbles from the beach and
throwing them into the sea. Have fun!
Hand and finger play
Action rhymes such as ‘Incy wincy spider’, ‘One potato, two potato’ and ‘Tommy Thumb’ are great fun and get
their hands and fingers moving. Playing with salt dough or clay really helps strengthen little fingers, as does
cookery and using simple toolkits.
Hand–eye co-ordination
Pouring water into jugs and cups of different sizes, sweeping up with a dustpan and brush, cutting, sticking,
tracing, threading beads, completing puzzles, peeling off stickers and sticking them in the right place – these
all help hand–eye co-ordination.
Pencil hold
The ‘pincer’ movement needs to be practised. This is important as it enables children to hold a pencil properly
as they write. Provide them with kitchen tongs and see if they can pick up small objects. Move on to
challenging them to pick up smaller things, for example, little cubes, sugar lumps, dried peas, lentils, first with
chopsticks, then with tweezers.
Ask children to peg objects to a washing line.
Provide plenty or different types of pen and pencil; hold their hand to practise the correct grip.
Phase 3
The purpose of this phase is to:

teach more graphemes, most of which are made of two letters, for example, ‘oa’ as in boat

practise blending and segmenting a wider set of CVC words, for example, fizz, chip, sheep, light

learn all letter names and begin to form them correctly
 read more tricky words and begin to spell some of them

read and write words in phrases and sentences.
CVC words containing graphemes made of two or more letters
Here are some examples of words your children will be reading: tail, week, right, soap, food, park, burn,
cord, town, soil
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Their confidence from the daily experience of practising and applying their phonic knowledge to reading and
writing is really paying off!
Tricky words
The number of tricky words is growing. These are so important for reading and spelling: he, she, we, me,
be, was, my, you, her, they, all.
Ways you can support your children at home

Sing an alphabet song together.

Play ‘I spy’, using letter names as well as sounds.

Continue to play with magnetic letters, using some of the two grapheme (letter) combinations:
r-ai-n = rain blending for reading
rain = r-ai-n – segmenting for spelling
b-oa-t = boat blending for reading
boat = b-oa-t – segmenting for spelling
h-ur-t = hurt blending for reading
hurt = h-ur-t – segmenting for spelling

Praise your child for trying out words.

Ask teachers for a list of the tricky words.

Set a timer. Call out one word at a time and get your child to spell it on a magic board or a small
whiteboard, against the timer – remember, they can use magnetic letters.

Play ‘Pairs’, turning over two words at a time trying to find a matching pair. This is especially helpful with
the tricky words: the the, to to, no no, go go, I I

Don’t worry if they get some wrong! These are hard to remember – they need plenty of practice.
Phase 4
Children continue to practise previously learned graphemes and phonemes and learn how to read and write:
CVCC words: tent, damp, toast, chimp
For example, in the word ‘toast’, t = consonant, oa = vowel, s = consonant, t = consonant.
and CCVC words: swim, plum, sport, cream, spoon
For example, in the word ‘cream’, c = consonant, r = consonant, ea = vowel, m = consonant.
They will be learning more tricky words and continuing to read and write sentences together.
Tricky words
said, so, do, have, like, some, come, were, there, little, one, when, out, what
Ways you can support your children at home

Practise reading and spelling some CVCC and CCVC words but continue to play around with CVC
words. Children like reading and spelling words that they have previously worked with, as this makes
them feel successful.
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Make up captions and phrases for your child to read and write, for example, a silver star, clear the pond,
crunch crisps. Write some simple sentences and leave them around the house for your child to find and
read. After they have found and read three, give them a treat!

Look out for words in the environment, such as on food packaging, which your child will find easy to
read, for example, lunch, fresh milk, drink, fish and chips, jam.

Work on reading words together, for example, a street name such as Park Road, captions on buses and
lorries, street signs such as bus stop.
Phonics teaching will continue into Key Stage 1 (Year 1 and Year 2)
As your child enters Key Stage 1 (Year 1) they will continue to take part in daily sessions on phonics.
They will learn that most sounds (phonemes) can be spelled in more than one way. For example, the f
sound can be written as f as in fan or ff as in puff or ph as in photo.
This develops their knowledge of spelling choices. They will continue with this spelling work into Year 2 and
beyond.
They will learn that most letters and combinations of letters (graphemes) can represent more than one
sound. For example, the grapheme ea can be read as /ee/ as in leaf or /e/ as in bread.
This supports their reading development.
Good phonics knowledge and skills help your child to read words fluently and spell words, but they need to
understand what they are reading and understand the processes and purposes for writing too. Your help is
vital here.
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Ways you can support your children at home: reading together
Teach lots of nursery rhymes – each one tells a different story.
Enjoy and share books together – buy or borrow books that will fire their imagination and interest. Read
and reread those they love best.
Make time to read with your child throughout their time in school – PLEASE continue reading to your
child, even when they are reading independently. This is very important – your child needs to practise their
reading skills every day, and needs the support of an interested adult. Grandparents, older brothers or
sisters can help, too.
Let them see you reading – grown-ups can share their magazines about their favourite sport or hobby.
Read with your child – ask your child to attempt unknown words, using their phonic skills and knowledge.
Make sure they blend all through the word.
Talk about the meaning of the book, too – take time to talk about what is happening in the book, or things
that they found really interesting in an information book. Discuss the characters and important events. Ask
them their views. Provide toys, puppets and dressing-up clothes that will help them to act out stories.
Explain the meaning of words (vocabulary) that your child can read but may not understand, for example,
flapped, roared.
Listen to story tapes.
Teach your child some action rhymes – ‘Heads, shoulders, knees and toes’, ’Here we go round the
mulberry bush’, ‘We all clap hands together'. Use tapes and CD-ROMs of nursery rhymes to sing along to.
Read simple rhyming books together – leave out a rhyming word now and then, and see if your child can
work out the missing word. If not, you say it.
Borrow or buy the best books you can to share with your child. Libraries and bookshops can advise you of
the most popular books.
Add sound effects when reading a story and encourage your child to join in.
A quiet area with some cushions and toys is a comfortable place where you and your child can go to look
at a book together.
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Ways you can support your children at home: writing together
Magic writing boards are great fun for children, both little and larger versions. It won’t be long before they
will be trying to write their names!
Write with your child – ‘think aloud’ so they can hear the decisions you are making as you write. Make
sure the writing is for a purpose, for example, a birthday message, a shopping list, an address.
Talk about the words they see in everyday life – food packaging, signs in the supermarkets, captions on
buses and lorries, messages on birthday cards and invitations.
Write a shopping list together.
Send an email to a family member or a friend – your child says the message, you write it!
Provide your child with a shoe box full of things to write with – writing tools of various sizes and
thicknesses: gel pens, crayons, glitter pens, rainbow pencils, old birthday cards, coloured paper, sticky tape
to make little books. Rolls of wallpaper can be attached to a table or wall to provide a large canvas for their
writing and drawing.
Praise them for their play writing – those early squiggles and marks show that your child is beginning to
understand writing.
Ways you can support your children at home: what to do if your child is reluctant to read or
write at home
Relax!
Reading

Make sure your child sees you reading.

Read to your child. Show you like the book. Bring stories to life by using loud/soft/scary voices – let
yourself go!

Spread books around your house for your child to dip into.

Let your child choose what they would like to read – books, comics, catalogues.

Read favourite books over and over again. Enjoy!
Writing

Make sure your child sees you writing.

Compose an email together, inviting a friend over to tea.

Continue to make words together, using magnetic letters.

Leave a message on the fridge door and encourage them to write a reply to you.

Make up a story together about one of their toys. You write for them, repeating the sentences as you
write. When the story is complete they can draw pictures to go with it.

Buy stickers of a favourite film or TV programme and make a book about it.
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Useful websites and leaflets for more information
www.parentscentre.gov.uk/foragegroup/3to5years/readandwritetogether
This link to the Parents Centre website gives some really good ideas about how you can enjoy sharing
books with your child and tells you a bit more about phonics.
www.parentscentre.gov.uk/foragegroup/5to7years/alittlereadinggoesalongway
This link gives ideas about how to help your child as they are learning to read.
www.read-count.org/index.asp
A website for you and your child to explore together – it will give you some ideas about reading with your
child and has online games for young children to play, both with you and on their own. It also has ideas for
games to play away from the computer.
www.bookstart.co.uk
This website provides information about the national Bookstart scheme and the Bookstart packs that your
child will receive as a baby, a toddler and at age three to four. It also gives information about sharing books
with your child. You can find out about Bookstart events in your area, which you can attend with your child.
You can get ‘Learning Together’ leaflets – ‘The road to reading’ and ‘Making their mark – children’s early
writing’ (and other leaflets covering a range of topics) from Early Education, 136 Cavell Street, London, E1
2JA, telephone 020 7539 5400. You can also download them from the website www.early-education.org.uk.
www.talktoyourbaby.org.uk
This website provides lots of information for parents and carers of babies and young children, and
suggestions of activities, features, DVDs, books and events that are both useful and fun. You can have their
free newsletter emailed to you directly.
www.nationalliteracytrust.org.uk/familyreading/parents
The Family Reading Campaign website provides a wealth of information to support you and your family. The
Family Reading Campaign works to encourage reading in the home. It also offers many links to further
websites.
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